Don’t Take No for an Answer – Even from Yourself!

Turns out that Jessica Livingston, co-founder of YCombinator, one of the foremost innovation-driven accelerators in the entire world, points to “determination” as THE trait that ignites success among entrepreneurs. I heard this in a podcast she did with Foundr Magazine.

What that means is that as successful founders, we quite simply DO NOT give up. And we have to live “AS IF” success is in hand. That means we create our plans as if we’re already at the level we want to be in our businesses and more often than not, that’s a stretch!

And that also means that we need to be relentlessly determinded to make the vision of success in our lives and work truly GO.

I had quite a few (thousand) moments in this regard over the course of the past week in my life. I left the house at 4:30 a.m., Monday morning to fly, and landed at my home airport at 12:15 am Friday morning. I was at a sales meeting for one of Verde’s beloved clients and also, at the Verde planning meeting, among a few other stops. It was a grinder of a week.

I shot this from the plane on my way to Portland….

Why am I telling you this? Because I feel like I’m getting the “call up” right now – lots of opportunity and success to be had if I choose to get a little uncomfortable, double down on focus and expand what I believe is possible for life and work in my world.

Great things are happening that weren’t exactly planned. But that’s so how it goes.

Just this week, I was accepted into PitchFest, the startup venue and community of the Outdoor Industry Women’s Coalition (OIWC). In this exciting opportunity, I will be working with an amazing mentor on a pitch for Intrepid Entrepreneur. This is highly visible in one of my home markets – outdoor – as the pitch happens during the Outdoor Retailer Summer Market 2016 trade show.

Guys, I am beyond ready to show up for this. But, I also had Verde’s executive team vision and strategy session this week.

And guess what …. A 10-X commitment is required to drive my baby (of 15 years) to where it should be going. And I have a team of people who have blessed Verde (and me) with their incredible intellect, instinct and loyalty to drive this amazing company (which we’ve all grown) forward. That should be capitalized – now.

Verde and the Intrepid Entrepreneur are both out there and important now – and my job is to act as if I have two successful companies and a complete support team around each one. Focus is right up there in terms of what I need to do to make this all work.

I have to be at my absolute best to contribute what’s needed to get both of my companies continually moving ahead. I’m thinking big, staying positive and (trying) to act “as if.” How about you? Do you ever feel that you’re in the midst of incredible opportunity, yet secretly worried you have no idea how to pounce on that opportunity?

That’s what growth feels like – if it’s your vision of success, you have to just GO BIG and get after it!

Meanwhile, here’s a great article from Jessica Livingston of YCombinator on how to get to your vision of success in your start up!